EU starts probe into German carmakers over clean emissions

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BRUSSELS, Sept 18 (Reuters) - The European Commission said on Tuesday it had opened a formal investigation into whether German carmakers BMW, Daimler and VW Group had colluded to avoid competition in developing clean emission technology.

The Commission, which oversees competition policy in the European Union, said in a statement it was looking into whether the carmakers agreed not to compete with each other on developing and rolling out systems to reduce harmful emissions from petrol and diesel cars.

"These technologies aim at making passenger cars less damaging to the environment. If proven, this collusion may have denied consumers the opportunity to buy less polluting cars, despite the technology being available to the manufacturers," European Competition Commissioner Margrethe Vestager said. (Reporting by Philip Blenkinsop)